Love Like You
by nightmareStag
Summary: He should have known. He should have known that it was him and now that he does he had to leave. He had to put some distance between them because... ...How could any of this end in his favor... (Part 3 of the Night Watch series)
1. Chapter 1

**(** A/N **) This is the beginning of the end guys. I've decided that I'm going to write this with multiple endings, so... be ready for that I guess. So far I have 5 bad endings planned, 1 neutral, 1 good, and one true ending. This... this is gonna hurt whoops.**

 **Blackfallstar9: You are so sweet I literally can't. I was so worried that you had lost interest in us and in this fic. I'm so glad that you are still with us and that you are going to stick with us through all of this. I literally cry every time I read all of your reviews and I read them every time I get sad. Thank you so much fuck ughhh.**

 **Sweet-Strawberry-09: Thank you so much for reading! I'm glad you enjoyed it enough to read through the whole thing in one sitting. It really is a feat, and I'm glad that you took the plunge.**

The rain made him indescribably sad. It always bummed him out, but now he found himself unable to leave his bed when the humidity shot up and the scent of rain water permeated the air around him. Shizuo had never felt the pain of a heartbreak. He'd never allowed anyone in deep enough to have their sudden absence actually hurt him. Itzal's sudden abandonment left him confused, and sad, and undeniably _hurt_. Everything hurt now.

He thought it would have been okay. Maybe he's just as dumb as Izaya says he is, because it obviously wasn't. When he revealed his identity, he was sure that it was okay. He was so sure that Itzal was going to still love him, even if he was just the monster of Ikebukuro. His entire posture read fear. His shoulders shook, his knees buckled, even the dim glow of his eyes died entirely in horror. He left with a cry that reverberated with his pain and vanished in a cloud of black.

It was so cold for so long after that.

He felt betrayed– Shizuo had put so much trust into Itzal and now that was nothing. It took so much courage to do what he did. He opened up, and let this _stranger_ into his heart and into his life, and for what? To be tossed aside the minute he tore down that final barrier to this other person; someone else with inhuman powers. Someone else who was a _monster_.

Yeah.

That's all Shizuo was.

He could see it in the way the people on the streets looked at him. He could see it in the way that his friends and family tiptoed around every passing second they spent in his company. But most important of all, he could see it in the way that Itzal left him.

And not just Itzal.

Things had finally been getting better between him and Izaya, and abruptly, that flea had vanished too. Twelve years of being at each other's throats, and Izaya was the one to make the first move to fix it. It had always been Izaya. Izaya was the one that spotted him on the first day. Izaya had been the one to pick the fight when Shinra had first introduced them. Izaya had been the one to get him arrested and fired, and to show up just so that he would always be at the forefront of the other's mind.

And Izaya had been the one to call it quits on the rivalry.

He had reached out to Shizuo, and Shizuo found trust in that. He liked the way that Izaya would smile at him– really smile at him. It wasn't that smirk that cut much sharper than his laugh, or the fire of adrenaline and passion in his eyes, or even the knives he just loved to throw at Shizuo.

He just didn't understand it.

Why did he leave? Better yet– where did he go? At least if he knew that he could go find Itzal.

Or Izaya... for that matter.

Shinra told him about Izaya's sudden absences. His job was dangerous, and if things got a little too heated, then he would need to step out. That wasn't abnormal. The weird thing was that nothing seemed to have happened to cause Izaya's absence. The yakuza had stepped back for the time being, from what Shizuo had heard. They took a major hit to one of their lines– at least that's what the whispers on the street had said.

Shizuo had never really paid attention to any of the rumors until Izaya's name was laced in with them. Most were the basic, "He's been sent away for field work," or the occasional, "He's spying on some people." But then there were the ones that told of Izaya's blood spilled across concrete floors and bullets lodged in his brain, finally stopped of its rapid processing. There were the rumors of his body lying in a ditch with his knees bent at wrong angles and his head severed on Shiki's desk. There were the rumors of Izaya chained to walls being beaten and raped on the daily by angry clients. The idea of Izaya dead– actually gone from this world– made Shizuo want to throw up and scream all at the same time. He had never realized just what an impact Izaya had made on him.

Even before they had entered their carefully maintained _friendship_ , Izaya was always running laps in Shizuo's mind. The second they had met, the smell of the musty basements he worked in violently assaulted Shizuo and a voice of bitter honey taunted him, and from then on, Izaya was all that Shizuo could think about. Izaya distracted him from everything. He pulled Shizuo's focus from school, from his family, from his success, but he was also there to pull away everything about his fights, his inadequacy, his regrets, and his violence. He was never afraid of Shizuo, and no matter how much that had annoyed him when they first met, he craved it now that he was gone. Izaya had never once looked at him like he was a monster. Sure, he called him one a lot, but it was always said with a playful lilt and a smile that never quite seemed to meet Izaya's eyes.

Izaya was really pretty when he smiled. When the gentle upturn of his lips stayed that way as the brightness lit up the rest of his face. His eyes were always especially expressive when he wasn't paying enough attention to stop them. It wasn't just his smile that was pretty now that Shizuo had really thought about it. Izaya had an odd face– it was rounded enough to make him look feminine and also sharp enough to make him look dangerous. His eyes were leering, equally so to match his teeth and tongue. The mahogany glow of them was wrapped in contrastingly thick lashes. Shizuo thought they were long enough to send a tsunami over the Japanese coast when they fluttered. His inky black hair looked as soft as silk as it laid on his head. Shizuo remembers an instance in high school, when Izaya had worn the girls uniform when the dean finally forced him into blue, he had two little clips pinning his bangs back against his forehead. He looked good like that– nails polished red, mascara coating his already impossibly long lashes, and the slight red tint his plump lips. Technically, he didn't specify _which_ uniform Izaya had to wear, so Izaya flounced up the steps in a too short skirt with a too wide swing in his hips.

Yeah, Izaya was pretty distracting, but now he was gone, and with him, went the color of Shizuo's life. When he and Itzal vanished, Shizuo noticed how monochromatic the world really was, and that only reminded him further of the two. Every flash of black or red or white or every fur lined jacket hit like a stab directly into his heart. He missed them both dearly. Not only did their loss affect him like losing a limb, but Varona's betrayal left him jaded and angry. Now he didn't even have Izaya to talk to about it– not that he would. He couldn't trust that informant as far as he could throw him, especially not with a secret as big as that, but he could get there. When they first went to lunch, way back on that very awkward lunch date, Shizuo got to see what Izaya was really like. He wasn't this holy beacon of perfection and grace. He was awkward and funny. He was one of those people who's big brain overwhelmed his social skills, and he stuttered and he fell, and maybe that was okay.

He was by no means excusing Izaya's behavior. He was a dick. He was inconsiderate to those around him and selfish and greedy, but he was trying. Izaya was trying to be a better person, and he was apologizing, and he was making amends but now he was gone. He had vanished without a trace, and no one– not Shinra, not Celty, not Namie– no one would talk to him about it. Celty would try, but he thought she knew even less than him. Namie would outright ignore him. Shinra would just continue to say that he was okay. When Shizuo would ask where he went, Shinra would say away, and then he'd say that it would take some time, but he thinks Izaya will come back when he is ready.

"It's just really hard for him right now."

Shizuo drags his hand through his hair. "What do you mean?"

"He had an epiphany, of sorts," Shinra smiles over the rim of his coffee cup, "He's hurting, and needs time to recover before he assesses what's wrong with him running."

"But why won't he come talk to me about it? He said we were friends. Aren't friends supposed to help each other?" Shizuo sounds a little desperate to Shinra.

His friends were so stupid. Sure, Izaya was supposed to be the smart one, but this level of idiocy was just ridiculous. As usual, Shinra thinks that both of their problems would be solved if they just talked about it together. After all, that's what they were... _together_. They were together, the two of them, even if they didn't know it, and Shinra wants to tell. By God, he wants to tell Shizuo, but Izaya had an anxiety attack when he brought the idea up over the phone, and the last thing Shinra wants to do is cause Izaya to start cutting again.

He was sure that he already had.

He knew that the longer Izaya had stayed away and had lived and breathed this self hatred caused by some reckless ideology of Shizuo's affections, the more and more Izaya's skin would be cut open to bleed. Of course, it wasn't all because of Shizuo. Izaya had a lot of problems of his own already. As much as he put up a front of being completely in control, he was a mess. There's only so much abuse someone can take before they crack, and unfortunately, Izaya hit his peak at a young age. His parents made him feel unwanted and awful. His sisters did the same. His first love took advantage of him to the point that Izaya nearly killed himself then. He fell in love with someone that wanted him dead the entirety of their relationship for the first ten years. And then he finally finds a way to allow himself to be happy with that person, but he throws it away over some decision he made without the other's opinion.

Izaya was stupid. He was so stupidly fragile that the slightest bit of pressure against that paper heart of his tore it to shreds. Shinra hated Izaya's parents for letting him feel so unloved that when the first time he got affection, he latched onto it no matter how awful and abusive it had been. He hated Shiki for taking advantage of Izaya's trusting nature and breaking him down to nothing. Shizuo was supposed to be the good one– the end game for Izaya's suffering. But here he was, sitting in Shinra's house complaining about how much he missed Itzal and Izaya both without realizing that they were the same fucking person.

Shinra had figured that Celty would want him to just tell Shizuo considering how much he was obviously hurting about it, but surprisingly, she had told him not to betray Izaya's trust. Unfortunately, she didn't know what Shinra knew about Izaya and his... self destructive habits. He constantly tried to coax Izaya into just telling Shizuo, but Izaya would always just _shut off_. He wouldn't even respond once Shinra changed the topic.

What ever was happening to Izaya, it concerned Shinra. When Izaya had said he was planning on buying Bran Castle, Shinra was quick to discourage it. Not only was that place the cacophony of Izaya's shitty experiences, but there was just something _not right_ about the structure as a whole. It was a place of bloodshed, and with Izaya's powers mirroring something of a physical clairvoyancy, it didn't sit right with Shinra. Why would someone constantly tormented by the dead go somewhere that he know agitates his powers if not because he thinks he deserves the punishment?

Either way, Izaya was just as stubborn as his star sign would predict. He packed up shop and headed East, dealing information at half the speed from Romania. That had been about two months ago, and Ikebukuro had sure felt his absence. With Izaya's absence, nobody knew what was going on. The Dollars were constantly at the Yellow Scarves throats and the Blue Squares were running amuck instigating these alterations. Izaya wasn't there to hear about it first, so he couldn't tell the yakuza, and they couldn't stop it. Hell, they didn't even know what was happening until one of their deals was halted on the grounds of a turf war by a bunch of silly children in way over their heads. It was dangerous to be on the streets, but at least business was booming for Shinra.

Shizuo sighs again as his forehead meets the countertop. "I just wish that he would have said something to me before he left. Just a goodbye or _something_! Some sign that he was going to come back eventually."

"Itzal or Izaya?"

"Both," he groans.

"Well," Shinra continues, "I know _exactly_ how you feel about Itzal. What about Izaya?"

"What do you mean?" Shizuo asks quizzically.

"Well it's my understanding that you loved Itzal." Shinra pauses while Shizuo nods through his flush. "How did you feel about Izaya?"

Shinra suspects that he already knows the answer. It's obvious to him, and to Celty, who asked him about it recently. Even Tom came questioning the nature of their dates. Of course, both parties refused to acknowledge it– Shizuo saying it was no different than his outings with Tom, and Izaya chalking it up to wishful thinking on his part. It _kills_ Shinra to see them like this. Shizuo is so painfully in love with Izaya, and if Izaya's wrists were worth anything, it's a true testament to how much it was hurting him. He couldn't give Shizuo all of the credit. Shiki had accounted for most of the cuts, but Shinra had been the cause for more than a few.

The problem was, Izaya was a lot smarter than Shizuo, not just in a logical aspect, but a pathological one as well. He knew what love felt like. He knew when he had fallen in love with Shizuo. Unfortunately, Izaya also knew how to hide it. Shinra had known him for years, however. He had known that Izaya had ways of getting out his emotions, and unfortunately they weren't pretty. Why couldn't he do something like art or music? No. Izaya had to carve his skin open in orderly little lines like the streets cutting the city into neat, even portions of blocks in his path to getting away from everything. From Shizuo, from Shiki, even from Shinra himself– Izaya was always running. He is such a coward sometimes that Shinra wonders how he got the position he has, but he knows that Izaya's got a big brain, and a fast mouth, and can get about anything he wants if he _really_ wants it. That is, unless he wholeheartedly believes that thing is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, unobtainable.

"What do you mean?"

"Izaya's my friend, too– actually, he's been my friend longer than he's been yours– and you don't see me freaking out about his absence."

"Well, you're used to it," he declares, sure of himself in every fiber of his bones.

This isn't weird, he thinks. It's completely normal to be this concerned.

"Used to what?"

"To Izaya! To him just vanishing without telling anyone where he went or when he's coming back, if he's coming back at all. What if he's dead, Shinra? What if he's lying in some shallow grave in the middle of nowhere– just dropped there to get rid of him." His volume drops with his shoulders.

Shinra laughs, "Such is the life of an info-broker, Shizuo. You know this."

"This isn't funny. He could be dead out there and you can't even be bothered to care."

"He's not dead, Shizuo."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because he called me this morning."

"He _what_? Is he okay? Is he coming back?" Shizuo's questions spit out at rapid fire. The empty shells of the bullets that shot off his tongue tap against the floor of his brain when he notices the way Shinra is smirking at him. "What?" he demands.

"I'm not sure if Izaya will come back this time. He vanishes when things get really bad for him."

"Is he in danger?"

"Metaphorically, yes. He'll destroy himself at the rate he's going."

"What's wrong with him?" Shizuo whispers. "I want to help him."

Shinra sighs, "I can't tell you, despite how much I want to. It's not my place."

"I know they're together," Shizuo declares.

Shinra pauses and sets his tea down. "I'm sorry?"

"I know they're together," he repeats. "Izaya and Itzal. I can feel it. You know they are, don't you?"

"I can tell you they're really, _really_ close," Shinra smirks.

Shizuo cocks an eyebrow, but doesn't ask him to elaborate.

"Maybe," Shinra continues, "You should go sniff around his apartment. I can't give you the number he's contacting me from, but if you find it… I'm _sure_ he wrote it down somewhere for his secretary before he left."

Shizuo's already out the door when he turns around again.


	2. Chapter 2

**(** A/N **) whoop whoop a doop! There's porn in this chapter whoops**

 **Blackfallstar9: im ded. I literally live for your reviews so please don't feel bad omg. Also sofar, there's like five bad endings and a neutral, good, and true, so I hope you enjoy reading all of that! Can't wait to hear from you again. d(3)b**

 **Guest: Ahhh thanks. I'm sorry that you had to wait this long, but I was having a hard time figuring out how to get the plot here. Thank you so much, and I dearly hope that you're still with us.**

 **Once again, there's dingles in the chapter whoops**

It was starting to give him a headache. Shinra kept acting with this aloof aura about him, like he knew something that Shizuo didn't, and yeah, he did, but Shizuo can't help the gnawing in the back of his mind that there's way more to this than he thinks there is. Regardless, there's just something about the way Shinra presented the information he had- he seemed like a teacher trying to lead Shizuo to this great revelation that he just hasn't had yet.

Shizuo goes over the facts in his head. For starters, both Itzal and Izaya have been missing for two months. Shinra knows where Izaya is, but he's not talking to him or even Celty. Shinra seems to think that he can find out where Izaya is on his own just by sniffing around his apartment. The problem is, he's tried that already. About a week into Itzal's disappearance, he went to Izaya's to ask him for help. He's the best informant, probably in the entire Eastern hemisphere, and everyone knows it. If anyone knew where Itzal was, it was bound to be him. He knew everything about everyone, didn't he? Well, except Shizuo. He only knew that Shizuo was some dumb monster. He didn't know about Ursus, or Helectric, or how much it hurt to deal with the absence of both him and Itzal, especially at the same time. He never took the time to learn anymore than he thought he knew about Shizuo, but he was always like that. Despite that massive brain of his, Izaya was a creature of habit, much like Shizuo. He would come to his conclusion and stick with it before looking for anything that could possibly prove him wrong. Both of them were adverse to change, even if it was for the better.

Shizuo thought that he didn't like change because he was happy where he was, and change normally lead to something bad. Except when it didn't. There were moments of clarity in his haze of pessimism. He was so cold towards Itzal because he looked like bad news, and his black suit and piercing red eyes reminded him of Izaya. He fell in love with Itzal.

And now that he's entertaining the thought, if Shizuo had a little more control– if Izaya was a little bit less of an asshole– he thinks he wouldn't be as guilt ridden as he is now. All of his conversations with Shinra have opened up an entirely new perspective on Izaya as a _person_ rather than the enigma or idea that he represented before. He wasn't the god he tried so hard to become. He was a person who had been abandoned by everyone in his life. Anyone that got close to him hurt him, whether intentional or not, so he stopped letting people in. His parents, despite how they tried, weren't there. Shinra had told him that something happened with Izaya when he was little, and then they relatively vanished from his life, but Shizuo gets an inkling that that was entirely intentional on their part. He wouldn't specify what happened when Izaya was young, but he didn't need too. Shizuo was content with the knowledge he was given. If Shizuo's parents didn't give up on him when he literally picked up a fridge, then there was no justification for intentionally leaving your son to the care of nannies that probably didn't show him any of the love he deserved.

Shinra had cleared the air on the violent stabbing that Shizuo had thought had been done by Izaya. Shinra wasn't aware of the gritty details of what happened to Nakura after that, but he did know that it left Nakura's mind in shambles. He was a completely different person than the one that had attempted to murder Izaya in middle school– a mere shell of the man that he had the potential to be. And maybe it was for the best. From all the stories he had heard from Shinra and the general cacophony of middle school rumors lost in translation, Nakura was a bad guy. He wasn't one of those guys like Shizuo, who was bad by default, he was someone like Izaya, who was evil with intent.

No, that isn't right either. Izaya doesn't normally have direct intent to wreak havoc. He sets up these strategic, well-orchestrated scenarios to test the limitations of humanity. Whether the pieces fall in a good or bad way is never Izaya's direct involvement; it's simply the cards of fate falling into place however they may land in whatever dance they settle in. Izaya never intentionally sets someone up for failure or success. He provides options which, in its own right, is still meddling and still ends up with a lot of people hurt, but that is never his intention. He allows people to fail while watching with every option stacked in his favor to assist, but he never acts on it. Izaya puts people's fates into his own hands and watches them trickle through his fingers like sand, and that's all they are to him. He had once said to Mikado, "If you truly want to continue escaping from everyday life, you've no other choice but to keep evolving. No matter whether you're aiming higher or lower." That's all he does. He forces people to evolve, even when their contented in their life style– especially so for those that aren't. And most times, it's for the worse, such as it was for Mikado, but occasionally it's for the better. There are times when his intervention saves lives. Shizuo's seen it in the harem Izaya was decorated in back in high school, and his current cyber following he had heard about from Shinra. He's taken passing glances at open emails and message boards before his anger overwhelms him into combat. He's seen "thank you"s and "you saved me"s littered in the black text glowing against the red in Izaya's eyes, even if only for a second.

It has always forced Shizuo to pause, huff, or flinch. The messages serve as a momentary reminder, a moment of clarity in the haze of adrenaline and the heat of a temper too short for anyone's good. Unfortunately, it was all that was needed to alert the ever vigilant Izaya of Shizuo's presence and proximity before he pounced into action.

Shizuo never understood it. He never understood why people would say something like that, to _Izaya_ nonetheless. He wasn't a good guy. He was the bad guy. Bad guys don't get "thank you"s. Bad guys get thrown in jail or beaten up by the good guy. Shizuo halts himself. By following that logic, that would make Shizuo the good guy. After all, he's the one that is always trying to hit Izaya. But if Izaya is saving lives from behind his computer screen, and Shizuo is always hitting him, does that make Shizuo the bad guy?

When he shared this question with Celty, she told him that no, he wasn't the bad guy, and recently, she had begun to insist that Izaya wasn't either.

"The world wasn't as black and white, as you see it. No one is either entirely good, or entirely bad. Sometimes good people do bad things, but they're still good people."

She pulls her phone back into her chest and continues to type before showing the screen back to Shizuo.

"Somethings are gray, and are meant to be in the gray."

"I hope he's okay."

She's talking about Izaya. He knows, and she knows, and both of them know that it's a sore subject for Shizuo.

"Me too," he adds sincerely. "I just wish I knew where he was."

This conversation was old and practically a mantra with how many times Shizuo had gone over it in his head. It sounded like something Izaya would say. It sounded like the same metaphor that would fall from a crooked smile to the concrete like spilled blood. Izaya would laugh then. It would be bright and maniacal and make Shizuo's chest flutter with some unnamed feeling strong enough to overtake the immediate rush of anger. Then he would say something about having to dumb it down for Shizuo and his "protozoan brain." And then he would step in close and talk animatedly with his hands and explain something that went way over Shizuo's head. And how could it not? Izaya would have an honest light in his eyes, like a child talking to their good friend, and a smile would purr across his face for a candle flicker of a second. It would be one of his genuine smiles that made Shizuo faulter in his judgement before those eyes shrunk to slits and his mouth curved into that same serial killer-esque grin that showed his teeth as straight and white as grave stones in a military memorial.

Shizuo cringed to himself. Sometimes Izaya was the most beautiful person he had ever seen, but at others, he looked like the monster hiding in the back of your closet as a little kid. His expressions were so large and loud, such as everything else he ever did– be it the way he walked, talked, or acted. He made his presence known if he wanted it to be, but if he didn't, he could slip by without anyone knowing. Unless, of course, that person was Shizuo. Izaya's scent would crawl its way into his nose until Shizuo's brain was entirely clouded with thoughts of red eyes and a dangerously deceitful smile.

Shizuo kicked weakly at a rock on the sidewalk. It'd been so long that Izaya's scent had bled more and more out of the concrete in the city with each passing rain. Right now, even as the rain fell in sheets of ice around the edge of his umbrella like a barrier, Shizuo could barely track the recent pathways Izaya had once taken.

Winter was the worst for Shizuo. He enjoyed the holiday atmosphere that came with Christmas, and the attempts that people made at being better in light of resolutions. He liked the way everyone seemed happier and it also gave him an open excuse to bat away loneliness with his friends and family. But he hated the cold, and more than that, the sting of the wind reminded him too much of the one person he wanted to see the most.

He folds his umbrella into his hip as he steps through the threshold of Izaya's apartment building and heads to the elevator. This isn't the first time that he's made this trek. He frequented Izaya's apartment about a week and a half after Itzal's disappearance, prying at Namie until she threatened him with either physical violence or police intervention. Shizuo doesn't think that she would actually get the cops involved, especially given Izaya's line of work and her affiliation with that. She also smells like embalming fluid and that serves to raise a few heads given her family's background as a pharmaceutical company.

If she's here, then she can just sit tight and leave him to rummage through Izaya's things. It's not like she could actually do anything to stop Shizuo if she really wanted to (which she does), but he would very much prefer to avoid an altercation with Namie if possible. He can't exactly make an enemy of the person that continuously drops little hints of Izaya's whereabouts. And she does do that. She's the one that originally told him that he had left, and wouldn't be back, and she did say that they had stayed in contact, and she was still doing stuff for him here in Japan, so that means that he wants to maintain ties to home. That's what Shizuo took from it.

He arrives at Izaya's door, and feels a purr of familiarity. Izaya smells so good. Shizuo had always thought that he stunk and had blamed him for the way that he reeked, which technically was his fault. He didn't have to have the job he did. Regardless, behind all of that was the smell of a warm-baked berry cobbler. He smelt like blueberries and raspberries, boiled in sugar and their own juices. Shizuo would be unstoppable if he had a candle that smelled like the inside of Izaya's neck. At least, that's what Shizuo thinks it would smell like. It's what his house smells like.

The heavy contrast in Izaya's apartment always seem to throw Shizuo off. Everything was either dark or light (normally dark) and Namie always kept the wall length windows closed. It was dark as always when Shizuo finally pushed forward the door. Namie "accidentally" told him where the spare key was, probably knowing that he would be frequenting Izaya's house.

It was time to play detective. Namie wasn't there, surprisingly. Her usual spot on the couch was void of any presence or life, and seemingly had been for a few days. Izaya's apartment was normally squeaky clean without a speck of dust on any glace surface or ingrained in any dark wood. At the moment, Shizuo could see the fine settling of grey that dinged the white counters and furniture. No one had been here in a few days, and now that he thought about it, why would she come? Izaya wasn't here. Izaya hadn't been here in quite a while, and if she was still doing work for him, than she could probably perform it at her own home.

He's already rifled through Izaya's desk. Every drawer and cabinet that wasn't locked had been haphazardly torn open and sniffed around when Shizuo was first looking through everything. His book shelf contained nothing of interest either– just books on human psychology and celtic folk lore. There are a few filing cabinets, all of them labeled with three characters to another three characters to mark the last names of the files within them.

He's curious about Izaya's desk though. As weird as the Z-shape is, there's only one drawer in the whole desk that has a legitimate lock, and even then, it looks like it was as a separate install rather than an actual part of the desk. Shizuo was looking for a key then, and Namie said it was upstairs but then wouldn't let Shizuo go upstairs.

She wasn't here now, though.

And with that in mind, Shizuo took the stairs two at a time. There's a hallway with two doors on the left, double doors on the right, and one at the end of the hall. There's a washer and dryer behind the double doors, and Shizuo can't help but think about how nice it would be to, not only have a washer and dryer in the house, but also to have it upstairs, where laundry was. He closes them and checks the first door on the left. Immediately, he takes a deep inhale of the air that floods out of the room.

It smells so heavily of Izaya that it's like he's there right now. Shizuo can't help himself. He wanders toward the bed and picks up the pillow dead center in the middle of the bed and brings it into his face. Given any other circumstance, Shizuo would feel creepy standing in the middle of his ex-enemy's– now newfound friend's– bedroom sniffing his pillows. But the heat that filled him as much as Izaya's scent did caused his knees to buckle.

Shizuo collapses onto Izaya's bed with a weak huff as he becomes completely encompassed in the smell of Izaya's skin that bled into that mattress and those blankets. They were soft to the touch, much softer than the fur of Izaya's jacket as it tickles his neck. And then Izaya is there– at least in Shizuo's mind. He pulls back and slides his jacket off his shoulders and onto the floor. Shizuo sits up then and reaches his hands to tug at the hem of his mind's Izaya's shirt. He pulls it up and off, and Izaya drops to his knees between Shizuo's parted legs.

Shizuo drags his hand from his knee to the clasp of his belt, but it doesn't look like his hand. It's pale and delicate like a spider's and Izaya's red eyes are staring into his from his place on the floor. Izaya looks absolutely ravishing. His pupils are so large that the black almost entirely encompasses the glowing crimson. His lips are parted, the pink of his tongue swiping across his lips before a cheshire grin purrs onto his face. Izaya's teeth are a little pointed as he smiles, but Shizuo can't dwell on that. Shizuo's mental representation of Izaya flutters his impossibly thick lashes shut before that mouth breathes heat onto his cock through the fabric. Izaya purrs and nuzzles against it again before Shizuo's hands, that look shockingly like Izaya's, open his pants and pull down his boxers just enough to let his cock spring from its confines.

The tip is flushed dark red against the tan of his skin. It throbs lightly in time with his heartbeat. He thumbs the tip of it at the same time that Izaya's tongue does. Izaya offers it a tantalizing lick and brings on of his hands to grip the base and hold it steady before bringing the tip into his mouth. Shizuo lets off some strangled breath and Izaya maintains eyes contact as he pulls more and more of it into the heat of his mouth. His tongue grinds against the bottom as Shizuo's cock gets closer and closer to the back of his throat.

Shizuo can't breathe. He's absolutely smothered from the minimal point of contact between him and an Izaya that isn't even there, but he feels like he is. He feels the hand Izaya has on his upper thigh, and he feels Izaya's mouth and tongue and throat instead of his hand. And he feels his hand slide into Izaya's hair. He can hear Izaya slurp and swallow at Shizuo like he's candy, and he can smell Izaya all around him like he's really there– like he's here right now, sucking Shizuo off with a beautiful grace that Shizuo can't even begin to describe. But then he isn't.

Izaya is pulling back and away from Shizuo's dick. He's standing, and losing his pants, and pushing Shizuo down to lay flat on the mattress horizontally. And then Izaya is climbing into Shizuo's lap, and shifting his pants further down his hips before he grabs the base of Shizuo's cock and positions it against a heat eons away from the weight of his tongue. And just like that, Izaya's sitting. His body is giving way to the intrusion of Shizuo pushing inside of him, and he's so _tight_ , and so _hot_. And Izaya throws his head back and lets out a strangled moan that sounds suspiciously like " _Shizu-chan"_ as it falls from Izaya's mouth.

Shizuo brings his hand to Izaya's face and just holds him wihile Izaya lifts his hips up and drops them again. He sets up a steady rhythm right out the bat as panting and moaning fills Shizuo's ears. He can't hear anything aside from his name tumbling out of Izaya's throat with each second that their hips meet. It's burning in the space where Shizuo's hand curls into his fever dream of Izaya's walls clamping down on his cock. The warmth from him is spreading into every fiber of his being from the core that Izaya's rocking against to the tips of his fingers. Izaya's hands move from the sides of the mattress pressed beneath Shizuo to his shoulders. He takes Shizuo's hand, the one against his face and holds it there as he rides Shizuo.

And in that instant, Shizuo believes that Izaya is the single most beautiful thing he's ever seen. And even right now, when rationally he knows that he's alone in Izaya's bed, and that Izaya isn't really here, fucking him like he cares about Shizuo's pleasure as much as his own, and that it's just Shizuo and his hand in an impossibly vivid imagination, he knows that he could never truly remember how gorgeous Izaya really is. This mental version of the one man he loves is a pale comparison to how breathtaking Izaya really is.

Shizuo snaps his hand down again. Even though he's aware of how weird this is, he isn't going to deny this picturesque scene of Izaya riding him that his mind has presented him. He never knew his imagination could be so vivid.

Everything is hot– hot and heavy and there's a pressure building in his abdomen while Izaya fucks himself harder on Shizuo's cock. His fist squeezes tighter, and so does Izaya, and he throws his head back and out of Shizuo's line of sight as he comes. And Shizuo tumbles into his release after him. It's blinding and heavy and all encompassing even as the imaginary weight of Izaya's hips fades from his sensation. He wishes that he could see Izaya, but his brain can't begin to come up with an imaginary representation without knowing that it would be a disappointing fraction of what he would really look like. And he's okay with that, he guesses. If Shizuo would find a way to see what Izaya really looked like when he came, hard and full, especially over Shizuo's dick, than every other person would pale in comparison.

It's cold now. His hand is sticky and covered in come as it comes off of his dick to zip himself back up. His sweat has cooled into a film on his skin. He feels dirty and gross, and the scent in the room and of Izaya's bed is exacerbating it to say the least. It smells like Izaya, and sex, and Shizuo's own sweat, and he silently hopes that another mental image of Izaya will appear (if not the real one). But nothing comes, so Shizuo stands on shaky legs and wanders into the master bath. It's all black and white, like everything else in this damn house, and Shizuo goes to wash his hands off and rinse down the drain the shame of the fact that he just technically broke into Izaya's house and masturbated in his bed. Behind him, there's a shower, and Shizuo gets a crazy idea to steal Izaya's soap.

If the fading smell from his bed drove Shizuo this insane, then the actual direct smell of whatever soap he uses would be urethral. Unfortunately, Izaya has a variety of weird fucking smells in his bathroom. There's one that smells like the same expensive cologne he's sure Izaya wears. There's one that smells like a forest, one that smells like old worn leather and fine scotch, and then there's one that smells like...

Rain water.

Shizuo feels it like a physical blow. He is in love with Itzal, not Izaya. _Right?_

He takes it, but the nagging voice in his head is telling him to keep looking for the scent of warm frosted berries. Eventually he finds it, but that doesn't stop how awful he feels. He feels like he's cheated on someone dear to him, even though he knows that's completely irrational. If screaming into the night and disappearing into the void for over a month wasn't a break-up, he didn't know what was.

Shizuo takes one last glance at Izaya's room. Miraculously, there aren't any stains on Izaya's blanket or his pants for that matter. The only evidence that Shizuo was there at all is the imprint on the comforter, and that's fine, he assumes. He leaves, with one final inhale of Izaya's fleeting scent, mainly covered by the smell of Shizuo's sin on his bed.

He trudges back downstairs. He hasn't entirely come down from his high, and the way his legs twitch and buckle as they switch the support of his weight is clearly evident of that. He stops by the small end table near the front door, and that's when he sees it.

It's a letter.

One addressed from Namie, at this current address, to Izaya.

Specifically, it's inscribed to Izaya with a Romanian address.


	3. Chapter 3

**(** A/N **)**

 **Blackfallstar9: I was super concernicus that you weren't gonna review, but im so so so happy that you did. It was just the boost I needed to kick my but into gear and get this out. Thank you so much for taking the time to write such nice reviews on every chapter. It really means a lot.**

 **Lucy Valkyrie: I'm really glad you like it !**

 **Once again, there's dingles in the chapter whoops**

 **Xx-xX**

Shinra is staring at Shizuo with that same knowing glint in his eye. It bothers him to no end. He always hated being around people that act smarter than him, despite the fact that most of the time they are. It wasn't as though he was stupid– far from it– but that didn't change the fact that people still treated him like he was a fucking idiot. He jumped to conclusions maybe a little too quickly, and once he came to a conclusion, he was stuck in it with no possible chance of changing it without irrefutable evidence or divine intervention. Or Izaya, but it was always different with Izaya, wasn't it?

The letter sits on the counter between Shizuo and Shinra like it's being interrogated for a crime. Shizuo stares at it for a long time. Regardless of what's inside, this is his key to finding Izaya. Well– it's his biggest clue at the time, he supposes.

"So what are you gonna do now?"

Shizuo's stare breaks away from the envelope to Shinra, who has subsequently said nothing up until this point.

"What kind of question is that?" Shizuo hisses. "I'm gonna go find him– isn't that obvious?"

Shinra's face strikes pensive for a fragment of time. "I don't know if that's the best idea."

"Well, why the hell not?"

Shinra clears his throat and wraps his hands together on the surface of the counter top. "I've known Izaya the longest. When he feels like he's backed into a corner, he'll respond with extremes. If he's in as bad shape as his texts would reflect, then I'm just not sure if you should drop everything and chase after him."

Shizuo stares back at the letter. A nauseous, uneasiness crawls deep in the pit of Shizuo's stomach. He's never understood the phrase "butterflies in the stomach." To him, it's always been more like wasps. Wasps that climb and dig through the muscle and nest in hard shells in his lungs. It's suffocating and painful, but he knows it's all in his head. There isn't anything that you can take for not wanting to admit that you're in love with someone.

"What are you gonna do about Itzal?"

The name causes Shizuo to flinch like he's been burned, and he has. His affections, which, until that night, he had thought would have been stronger than any apprehensions of his true identity, were scorned so hard that he can't even fathom how to bounce back from it. He doesn't know what Shinra is getting at, but he feels like he should, and he also feels guilty. Whenever he thinks about Itzal, it always seems like a passing thought in favor of Izaya. Shizuo knows this. He doesn't particularly understand it, but he seems to think it stems from a romantic intent on his part. Shizuo doesn't want to think about Izaya or his voice or his smile or his laugh. He doesn't want to think about those meals that were _definitely not dates_ when he found out that Izaya is capable of being funny and kind in a way that seems far more natural than any malice he's shared in the past. He absolutely doesn't want to think of the way Izaya's name came tumbling from his lips when he would masturbate or when he was actually engaging in sexual acts with someone else he claimed he was in love with.

He supposes that it comes from the nostalgic sense of love that clouds around Izaya. Shizuo knew that he was in love with Izaya. He knew that from day one, and simply refused to allow it due to his notion that Izaya was the "bad guy," and he was the "good guy" and bad guys and good guys can't be together (looking at you, Batman). But, maybe they could. At least, maybe the good guy could rehabilitate the bad guy, but when he thinks about Izaya fighting for justice like a good guy, the image doesn't sit well with him. That wouldn't be Izaya, he thinks, and then he wouldn't be the man that Shizuo had dubiously fallen in love with.

It proves that Shizuo's affections go deeper than shallow appearances. Sure, Izaya was beautiful– absolutely radiant at the best of times– and for the longest time of his high school career, Shizuo had attempted to convince himself that _that_ was why he was interested in Izaya. However, deep down, way deep down, he thinks that he rationally knew that was just a cop out. Izaya had told him that he would never be afraid of Shizuo, and instantly Shizuo fell fast and hard. And he's still falling. With Izaya off in Romania, not talking to him, or being here at all, Shizuo feels like he's at the bottom of an endless pit, forever falling, tumbling. Izaya has left him hanging by a thread, and the other isn't even aware of what he's doing.

The biggest problem with loving Izaya, is that Izaya could never love him back. Izaya loved _humans_. In Izaya's gorgeous, carmine eyes, Shizuo wasn't a human– he was a monster. Izaya couldn't love a monster, and that's what made Shizuo a monster. He loved all humans. Shizuo wasn't loveable. That made him a monster. It hurt, to say the least. The only person that wasn't afraid of his strength or temper hated him more than anything else in the world. Shinra had said that wasn't the case. He proposed the hypothesis that the key part in Izaya's reasoning that Shizuo was missing was the _"equally"_ part. Izaya loved all humans _equally_. He rarely allowed himself to fall romantically into the arms of another human, and if he did (that one time that ended fucking horribly) there was some other incentive: power, money, status, recognition. Shinra thinks that the reason that Shizuo was a monster was because Izaya had fallen in love with him– he loves him more than any other human he's ever met.

Shizuo doesn't think so, but Shinra continues to insist.

He refuses to entertain the idea. It would only be dangerous for Izaya and also himself if he had managed to convince himself that the other had actually fallen in love with him. That could never happen– at least that's what he told himself when they were out on their _completely platonic, non-romantic outings as definitely not a couple._

Shinra and Celty both looked a little skeptical at the crestfallen Shizuo when he explained their meals together. Both of them had agreed, against Shizuo's judgement, that it was a date. And from an outside perspective, maybe it looked like that. There was a romantic setting. There were flowery glances, soft smiles, and pleasantly comfortable periods of both conversation and silence.

Shizuo was always surprised when Izaya would propose a dinner. It was always Izaya that had to take the initiative to actually meet up with him, but he was always happy to agree (possibly a little too quickly than he should have been comfortable with). Their first lunch at that random shop had been a little too romantic, but it was a couple's restaurant. French places tended to be like that with their illusion as the city of love. Dinners at Russia Sushi had always been the more intimate meals. It was the closest Shizuo thinks they got to a date. For some reason, Simon made sure that they were practically alone in the own corner of the restaurant, which was nice for obvious reasons. It gave Shizuo a chance to really hone in on Izaya and all of the little quirks he has. When he gets nervous, he taps his ring on the side of his drink glasses. When he talks to people he doesn't particularly want to talk to, his stare settles on their nose, or their eyebrow, or something that isn't the collision of their eyes. He uses his hands when he talks– waves them animatedly with each syllable that falls off his tongue. He cracks his knuckles audibly when he gets bored. He's beautiful, and radiant, and just absolutely breathtakingly stunning that Shizuo can only stare for so long before he has to physically force his eyes away from Izaya's grin.

He misses him, so much so that he's realizing that even if he finds Izaya, he might just let Itzal go. He'll just let the other continue to hide in his self imposed exile so that he can truly focus on Izaya and how much he... _feels_... for him. But then he remembers all the chaste kisses and the smell of rain water that sunk into his clothes, in his head, into everything.

Shizuo hates it when it rains now. He never liked it to begin with, but now as the sidewalks flood with water, it reminds him of all the things that he wishes he could move on from. The snow isn't much better. Itzal's lips were always as cold and soft as the freshly fallen snow. Shizuo gets sad when he thinks about it. His sadness purrs into anger and then he thinks of the melodic lilt of Itzal singing that one song.

Izaya likes to sing too, Shizuo has found. He sings a lot though, when he thinks that no one is listening. Izaya sings very wide and open like he's been studying how to control the notes for years. He sings everything, too. Songs across all expanses of life, some more difficult in the notes than others, and in many different languages. His voice reminds Shizuo of a piano. It's delicate and quiet and beautiful– so much so that it's stopped Shizuo in his tracks so that he can savor the notes as they dance out of the expanse of Izaya's throat. He's mesmerizing when he sings. His face relaxes into something inhuman. He reminds Shizuo of a siren– radiant in face and song, and manipulative to the point of death.

Too bad he can't swim.

When comparing the two, Izaya and Itzal, that is, Shizuo decides that he likes Izaya's singing better, and entertains his thoughts with images of slow Sunday afternoons, of Izaya running his fingers through blonde hair and singing about love and all other happy things. It's a foolish image, dangerous even to conjure, but it makes him feel better. He thinks that it could happen. He wants it to happen possibly more than anything else in his world. He wants the domesticity with Izaya that he could never have with anyone else. Izaya can handle him. Izaya has always made every adaptation for him, and Izaya is generous in a way that Shizuo selfishly wishes to hold all to himself.

Shizuo has never been good with controlling himself. This fact is especially true for instances where the people he _loves_ are involved.

That notion in of itself is enough prove his adoration for Izaya. He loves him. He loves him more than he's ever loved anyone else. More than Itzal, more than any distraction of Varona, and more than any other person who's ever vied for his affections. He... He is so desperately in love with Izaya that in this moment, the air rushes out of his lungs like a physical blow that stings and hurts but he wouldn't have it any other way. The only thing that could possibly make this any better is if Izaya was _here_ with him in this moment- trapped in the cage of Shizuo's arms locked around his abdomen and holding him so tight that Izaya can't even think to run away again.

There's a certain determination in the way his fist clenches around the crisp edges of the envelope in his hand. He's going to find Izaya if it's the last thing he does.

Shinra doesn't seem to surprised or impressed with Shizuo's conviction, and Shizuo doesn't care. This isn't about how Shinra feels. This is about the suffocatingly heavy emptiness that rots in his chest like it's killing him, and the knowledge that Izaya is the only one that can fill it.

Shinra's words flood him. From the second long glances at sliced open wrists, Shizuo can only assume the worst when thinking of what Izaya defines as extremes. Surely he must be hurting where he is, but if that was really the case, then why not just come back? There's something he's missing– something that he can't place in the logic of Izaya's decisions and his own personal convictions. If he decides to go, he could very well be bargaining with Izaya's life, but if he doesn't, then he's consciously leaving Izaya alone to suffer on his own, which could have the same catastrophic effects.

 **I am horrifically sorry about how long it has taken for this. As college started for me, this project got shoved to the back burner for a while. The idea of multiple endings has been abandoned, however the fic itself has not. I will be posting this message on the next chapter as well, and once again. I'm sorry.**


	4. Chapter 4

**(** A/N **) I am horrifically sorry about how long it has taken for this. As college started for me, this project got shoved to the back burner for a while. The idea of multiple endings has been abandoned, however the fic itself has not. Once again, I'm sorry.**

 **Blackfallstar9: I'm so sorry that I left you hanging like this. Your reviews always light up my day, and I make it a habit to go back and read them whenever I got down. Here's the next chapter, I'm sorry about how the split got cancelled, and I hope you're still here reading this.**

 **Jojo: welp,, since the split got cancelled, you get to find out which one he chose! Thank you so much for your kind words and i hope you enjoy the next chapter.**

 **Crystal Bruner: Thank you! Reviews really are my main motivation, which is part of why continued to update this on a03 without updating it here.**

 **Xx-xX**

There's something in the way Shinra's eyes pleaded for his patience that drove Shizuo to take his advice. It doesn't feel right. There's a gnawing in the back of his head that's screaming at him that this isn't right, but there's not much else he can do. Shinra was worried about Izaya taking an "extreme" and from the way he delicately explained what goes on with Izaya and his knives behind closed doors, Shizuo doesn't like the idea.

He knew what he meant.

He knew that Shinra was worried that when cornered, Izaya, unable to deal with it because that little fuck never learned any coping methods, would take his life in an attempt to avoid his problems. It made Shizuo sick to his stomach to think about it, but the notion of Izaya doing it because he didn't want to see Shizuo _that bad_ made it even worse. It was a nail in a coffin, of sorts, or some other complicated metaphor that Shizuo didn't have the time nor the desire to figure out.

He felt as though he was "damned if he did, damned if he didn't" kind of situation. He didn't know how, but he knew somewhere in his gut that Izaya was hurting himself. Be it not eating, or sleeping, or cutting like Itzal did, it didn't matter. All were bad, and all were self destructive, and all were a very real and actual possibility, but for the first time, he decided that he would trust Shinra's judgement. He was chasing a fleeting chance at some one-sided puppy love with Izaya that caused him to attempt to prematurely bury the hatch with Itzal despite any real ability to really reconcile that.

He wanted to. By God, he wanted to. Shizuo craved a boon– craved that he would be able to hold Itzal in his arms again and that he could forget, even if just a moment, that Izaya was right and had been right all along. He was a monster. He was destructive and destroyed everything he had ever tried to protect.

But this isn't about him.

This is about finding Izaya and helping him so that he can help Shizuo find Itzal. Shizuo'd always been the one with the one track mind. He had a goal, and he would see it until the end, so why now? Why, when there was a very real possibility that either of them could be dead and alone, rotting in their own respective territories, when time wasn't just not on his side– but against him in his decision, did Shizuo find himself completely drowning in self doubt?

He can try and hide the reason behind some fabrication like heavy curtains in his mind to distract him, but he knows where the apprehension stems from. He knows that the poisonous roots of indecisiveness and personal self loathing are intertwining in a spire behind his eyelids and sucking in every absolute in his head and his heart. He hates it. Shizuo hates it more than he's ever hated Izaya, or the thugs that force him into a rage on a regular basis. He hates it more than Varona's betrayal. He hates it more than he's _ever_ hated himself.

However, that's just how life shakes down sometimes isn't it? It kicks and screams and fights for some chaos or malevolence until it gets it and then it either stretches on begrudgingly in a haze or it's killed at the hands of his owner.

And for the first time, Shizuo thinks he can see things from Itzal and Izaya's perspective. He understands why someone would cut themselves just for the sake of having any form of control, and he understands why death would be easier and in fact welcomed in the face of inner adversaries. He's felt like this for a measly two months and Izaya had been rotting in the empty shell of his apartment for years– decades even– that were spent dealing with this alone. Shizuo knows he has people he can talk to. He has Celty– has always had Celty, and he has Shinra, who seemingly has an endless well of knowledge about Izaya. But Izaya didn't have anyone. Izaya was left with a piss poor excuse for a friend and the overwhelming knowledge that everyone wants him dead. And unfortunately, it's true. You either wanted Izaya dead, or you didn't know who he was. It was a fact, one that had been carefully introduced and illustrated by Izaya himself in order to protect his loved ones.

He was an asshole to protect the ones he loves from getting hurt because of him. If he kept them all away- pushed every individual he had ever cared about at bay and away from his person than he could protect them from those that wanted to hurt him. His sisters, his friends, and any potential lovers had to be rejected so that they wouldn't be hurt. That's how Izaya's job works. He essentially gets paid to sell people out, and with that comes casualties and anger- both of which thrown into a stew of desired revenge and frustration. He never wanted anyone, seemingly all but himself, to get hurt. And the problem with that is that it meant shoving anyone and everyone so far out of harm's reach that he was alone to fight his own demons, and he was breaking. He had been chipped at for years upon years of misplaced anger stemmed from a lack of understanding, and his pristine crystal of a facade was giving way under the pressure of his daily life.

His constant exposure to the stress of his repetitive existence and the knowledge of his isolation was pressing down on him harder than the weight of the sky on Atlas' shoulders. He was suffering and alone because he wanted it that way at face value, but the glances that lasted a second too long in people's directions while they talked to their friends and held hands with their lovers told of his lies. He wanted that. He wanted companionship, but didn't want to support the weight of guilt in his danger by association. Izaya couldn't handle this for much longer, and any added weight would make him shatter.

At least, that's what Shizuo had hypothesized. He couldn't be sure. Shinra wouldn't talk to him about it, and Celty had gone into that dead end shuffle of conversation that she would when ever she was keeping something from Shizuo.

Shizuo wishes that he could tear down all the red tape. Everyone around him seems to be lying to him about something that must be pretty big. He can handle it when it's coming from one side (that side normally being Izaya), but when it comes from every angle, he drowns under the weight of their sideways glances at one another.

It's the worst when Celty lies to his face. She may not have a head, but she is far more expressive than any of his either friends, and the way her shoulders pull the muscles taut as they sink when she types out out that she "doesn't know how to help him" make him angry. He's never been angry with Celty before. If anything, Shizuo had always sought her out as a source of comfort– something to calm him down when he was at his wits ends, but now she was keeping things from him like she didn't trust him, and it sank into his skin just as heavy as the gaping hole in his chest.

"It's not my secret to tell," she had told him one day.

Then whose was it? Who was this mystery person that knew all?

It was Izaya, of course, but he was off-limits. It was a secret that Izaya knew and was keeping for whatever reason. Shizuo didn't know whether it was to save his own skin or to save Itzal's, but he knew that their lines crossed. The red strings of fate were knotted between those two. He knew it, and from the pensive face that Shinra gave him every time he asked about it was anything to go by, then Shinra knew it too.

There was something– something major that he was missing. He knew it was exactly what he needed. It was the leaflet, or the clue, or the hammer to the wall signifying the dead end in front of him. He just couldn't figure out what on Earth it was. He knew where it was. He knew it was off in Romania where ever Izaya was, and he knew that no one here was going to give him the answer that they all knew. He feels as though every move is being scrutinized by the privy eyes of those that call him a friend. Celty, Shinra, Simon, Tom– fuck, even Kadota was purring at him like he was so close, and yet so far away.

This double edged sword was cutting into his skin and marring him with a myriad of scars. Shinra had his concerns that Izaya would end his life if Shizuo acted on his desires for a council with the informant, but Shizuo knew that leaving Izaya all the way out there all alone was just as bad.

If not worse.

At least if he does something reckless while Shizuo is there, there's someone to call emergency services. And it's with that thought in mind that Shizuo retrieves his phone from his back pocket and sends one text message.

He's decided to take his brother up on his previous offer to pay Shizuo's way to Romania.

 **I feel like i let a lot of you down, and im terribly sorry for that. Thank you for staying with me if you're still here. I'm almost done with the next chapter now.**


	5. Chapter 5

**(** A/N **) Hey i actually got this up in reasonable time :00 I'm actually kind of proud of myself! This chapter has some pretty graphic depictions of self harm, so please be warned, and stay safe.**

 **Blackfallstar9: I am a mess every time I read your comments tbh like,, you're so amazing to still be here after all this time and your kind words never cease to make me incredibly grateful that I have the pleasure of writing for people that appreciate this story as much as you do.**

 **Xx-xX**

Izaya was close to vomiting, again. His stomach was eating itself up with guilt and the primal, ravenous hunger of not being filled in so long. He was sick, both in the head and body. The cuts in his wrists were worse than they had ever been, and the blood had long since sunk into the mattress. His sheets were once white, but now they were a deep crimson, almost brown, that reeked so heavily of iron that it made his already sick stomach recoil in anguish. He couldn't help it.

He didn't have energy to do much of anything aside from cut and cry and even the latter was coming to an end with his dehydration.

He knew his wounds were infected. The myriad of scars was caked with cracked and drying blood; a mountain of it had dried in thick globs over hot wounds. He was lethargic, not even being able to work, even if from his disgustingly bloody bed.

His phone rings on the nightstand next to him among the pile of used knives tossed after another session. He answers it reluctantly, deciding that it was better to keep up the façade then to have someone worry about his well being and go after him.

"Oh thank God, you picked up," Shinra sighed in relief over the receiver.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Well, you up and left when Shizuo told you it was him and went to Europe to brood about it, and now no one can get a hold of you, and you sound sick. I'm worried about you, man."

Izaya laughed dryly. Shinra had every right to be worried about Izaya, and both of them knew it. Shinra had some sort of intuitive sense about Izaya and had possessed that talent since they had first met. He knew when Izaya was doing bad, and he knew when things were going to get worse. He had called because he knew Izaya was doing bad. It was comforting, almost, to know that someone had actually cared, but even then the disgusting voice in his head told him it was all just a misplaced sense of guilt.

Shinra had been around far too long to not have some sense of duty in regards to Izaya's life. It was funny, almost. For the longest time, Shinra was a terrible friend, but now he seems to be trying everything in his power to keep Izaya around.

"Izaya, this isn't about Celty," Shinra cut in. "I know you're thinking that I'm only doing this because I want Celty to think I'm a better person, but I want you to know that even though I love her more than anything in existence, you are still my best friend. If Celty wasn't here, you would be the most important person in my life, and just because she is, that doesn't discredit your worth. I don't want to say you're like a brother to me because of... our _history_ , but you're like a brother to me, Izaya."

Izaya doesn't fight the weak smile that pulled at his face and splits his dry lips. Blood tasted as familiar as this banter and it's welcome with a not quite sigh of relief.

"Are you okay?"

No. He knows he's not, but Shinra has already wasted too much time and concern on someone that would be much happier slipping into their forced isolation. However, like with most things Shinra did, he went into it with ridiculous gusto and was determined to keep him alive no matter how much Izaya had yearned for the opposite.

"I'm fine, Shinra." The lie slipped out as to broken of a whisper to be convincing, but that didn't stop them from coating Izaya's mouth like something bitter and poisonous.

"I know you're not," he hissed into the receiver, "But if you would just talk to someone- _anyone_ for that matter. It doesn't even have to be me. You're not alone in this anymore, Izaya. There's people here that care about and are worried about you. Celty pesters me to check on you almost hourly, and Shizuo stops by almost every other day to see if I've heard anything from you."

His breath catches in his throat. "You didn't tell him anything, did you?"

"No, but he's not as stupid as you think he is-"

"Debatable."

"Izaya, I'm serious. You should see what this is doing to him."

"Yeah, of course he wants to find me. I'm the best informant in Japan. Let me guess- 'If anyone can help me find Itzal, it'll be him.' He said something like that, didn't he?" Izaya spit.

"Izaya, it isn't like that. I'm sure that's part of why he wants to find you, but he seems really worried about you. It's not like you to just disappear on us silently with no trace."

"What are you talking about?" he asked. "I disappear all the time- it's part of the job."

"This time is different. The city is empty without you. It's like everything is feeling the energy of your loss. Hell- everything is! No one has any idea what's going on anymore. There are turf wars everywhere. People are being robbed and murdered left and right and everyone is drowning in their own ignorance. Izaya, even the yakuza is floundering out there. They used to be the peacekeepers, the ones that everyone was afraid of interfering with. And now, without you, even _they_ have no idea what's going on."

There's a pause. "I can't come back."

"Why not?"

"I just can't." His voice is quiet now, barely audible. He sounds helpless to his own ears and he can't imagine what it sounds like to Shinra.

There's a scoff on the other end of the line. "What are you so afraid of?"

Izaya hung up after that. He told himself he didn't deserve that kind of disrespect, and that Shinra was in no position to make such remarks, but he knew Shinra was right. He knew that his friend was calling his bullshit, but he couldn't stop the way his stomach swelled to nausea at the thought of facing Shizuo again.

He thought that he was over this, but the crushing knowledge of Shizuo's identity brought back every horribly suffocating feeling of unrequited love that had plagued Izaya in high school- the impending rejection that pressed into his heart and tipped his shoulders forward on that first initial meeting from genuine interest to sinister intent. Izaya doesn't think he can bear that weight at close proximity again.

When he had realized what love felt like in his heart and the immediate bitter aftershocks of knowing who it was he yearned for, Izaya filled the hole it made with everyone and anyone willing to take its place. He used Shinra, Shiki, and every nameless mistake of a human that he let inside of him to fill the gaping space.

But it wasn't enough. It would never be enough to replace how raw and all encompassing what he felt for Shizuo was. He felt like he was drowning in oil for years. Almost a decade was spent with his mouth and nose being filled with ugly emotions that stopped his breath and thoughts of the second Izaya saw him in high school. His adoration was immediate. It was a spark of interest that made the adrenaline from the yakuza dim into nothing more than a watered down fragment of a high. Shizuo became his everything. He was an insatiable addiction- an itch that no matter how much he saw him and fought with him, he couldn't scratch it.

And suddenly it all cleared up.

He stopped yearning for abuse because he would take whatever interaction he would get. He was pulled to the surface and out of his own sorrow by sheer force from someone who had entered his life on a bed of secrecy. Ursus gave Izaya the love that he craved from Shizuo, and when the truth came out, it turned out to show Izaya what it meant to be loved by Shizuo. It showed him what he had wanted for so long, and showed him how good it could be even when they knew nothing about each other.

But that was the problem. It was good, great, even perfect when they knew nothing about each other but the basis of a skewed similar morality that they both shared and a physical proximity. But now Izaya knows everything about him. He knows that he has a manic sweet tooth and cares almost too deeply about his friends in family. He knows that nothing will ever come between him and his little brother. Izaya knows that his best friend is a headless woman, and that he works with one of his best friends from middle school everyday. And Izaya also knows that he hates him. He hates him more than anything else in the world, but the thought itself is almost comforting in the notion that at least they do have something in common outside of their suits.

Shizuo will never hate Izaya as much as Izaya hates himself.

If he had been a little more cautious- a little more patient with Shizuo when they first met, their relationship could have been something else entirely. But he didn't know when to quit, and Shizuo didn't know how to listen. Unfortunately for Izaya, he didn't learn the latter until the seeds of hatred had already rooted into irrevocability.

Izaya forces himself to stand. His conversation with Shinra, despite being emotionally taxing had given him energy he didn't know he needed. It felt good to talk to his old friends, even if they were berating him, because that just showed that they cared. Celty had sent him a message when he first left. Those two simple words spoke of eons of progress between the two. She wouldn't ever be directly hurtful to his face. She was too nice for anything more than some witty banter that tip toed the lines between jokes and honest insults.

"Stay safe," she had written to him, and every once in awhile, when he thinks the pressure is too much, he'll reread it.

Mikado had also tried to stay in touch in the beginning, but Izaya didn't have the energy to maintain those conversations for long. Mikado had the best intentions, almost always did, but when he would go on and on about the destruction brought on by the rival gangs and the absence of the yakuza in any of this, Izaya always felt partially at fault. He knew that if was still in Shinjuku- still acting as informant- that none of that would be happening. He knew it was ridiculous to shoulder all of the blame, but even Masaomi messaged him from time to time just to let him know that his old tricks still worked when the gangs got too hot-headed. He appreciated the interaction, enjoyed the notion that two people who have every right to hate him indirectly showed that they were worried about him in their own little ways. Both of them, like a twisted form of Hansel and Gretel would leave a trail of breadcrumbs of information and interesting happenings in an attempt to pull Izaya by force out of his slump.

Though Izaya never took the bait, they kept trying anyway. Mikado had gotten a hold of Izaya's personal phone number when he was still running with the Dollars, and he had seemingly forgotten about it until he got the first text message. Shizuo can't reach out to him. Izaya didn't allow Shinra to give out that number, and lucky for him Shizuo didn't think to ask anyone else.

Regardless, the efforts, no matter how fruitless they may be, are the only thing that keep Izaya from taking the final plunge. There's a certain level of determination that sets in when you're worried about leaving others behind. He doesn't like the idea of leaving behind someone to deal with his loss. It's a mentality that paints his friends in a selfish light. He isn't staying alive for himself. He's staying alive for Shinra, and Kadota, and even Shizuo. He's staying alive for every hot pot he won't get invited to just because of distance. He's staying alive for the phone calls and the text messages that go unanswered because he doesn't have the energy- and he's staying alive on the hope that maybe something will get better.

That's been what his entire youth had been. Izaya had just forced himself to get up and put on this mask that everything was okay because he was holding out for the idea that maybe one day, he would stop needing to pretend that everything was okay. That hasn't happened yet, and as the months turn to years, Izaya was afraid that he'd be faking it his whole life- as though the day would never come that Izaya was able to be honest about how he's feeling. He didn't believe in holding out for a happy ending, his inner pessimism dipping into the nauseousness that came with hope.

Izaya's head spun in a disgusting mixture of regret and sickness from his wounds. The blood loss made him light headed beyond belief, but the infection that made his skin burn and itch in a way that was grounding. It was disgusting, and he knew that he should have felt ashamed of himself, but he couldn't help the way he yearned for the decisive weight of a knife in his hand, and the numbing sting of the blade plunging into his skin to add to the myriad of scars littering his body.

His wrists were the worst. Before all of this, Izaya couldn't be bothered with the theatrics of exposing more skin to split. His sweater sleeves were ruined with the way the hems were tugged by gritted teeth, but he needed it before he could decide against it, and the job would always be haphazard and rushed. Now the plasters that should have long been replaced, pulled at the skin on his inner and outer thigh uncomfortably as they pressed into the stitches tied with shaking hands. He didn't care enough- couldn't muster the energy necessary to clean the self inflicted wounds, or stitch the skin with any semblance of care for whether or not the wounds actually closed.

He was tired. His powers had careened him into himself and into this fucking castle of sorrow for him to wallow in. He was sad, perpetuated by the bad taste the air had to it, like the energy of the building itself was still the epicenter of torture that it once was when rumors of Dracula's existence fluttered through the towns like fog. The blood shed here infected Izaya's dreams, and while he knew this, and he knew the way that guilt and anger swallowed him, he did nothing to stop it. He let the suffering of the souls lost in this castle bleed into his being, and sat apathetic of the effects.

The bed creaks as Izaya pulls the sheets off. He'd planned on washing them tonight in hopes that it would rid the air of that foul copper smell, but the incriminating red stain absorbed into the layers of the mattress seemed to have different plans. The fatigue in Izaya's bones drags heavy as he takes his phone and a knife with him into another room of the castle. He'll have someone come out tomorrow and get rid of the bedding, but for now he's choking on his own self disgust.

Izaya goes straight to the bathroom connected to the en suite of the new room, and digs under the sink for the first aid kit he had made sure to have in every room. His hands are trembling as he peels the soiled bandages from around his wrists, and gingerly pulls at the cotton pads fastened to his hips. Those come off with a wet _shulk_ of blood clots pulling the skin taut against the hardened black of the pus on the surface. The infection is apparent all over his body. His eyes catch the empty reflections of crimson long gone dark in the mirror.

He doesn't even recognize himself.

Izaya stares at this person in the mirror with revulsion. He looks sick and weak- skin gone nearly translucent without proper blood supply, and bags that pull heavy enough at his eyes to sink fatigue into his expressions as well. The cuts are bright and angry and bleeding against the pale of his skin. He looks horrible, and for the first time in months, chokes on his own weakness in a way that isn't total apathy.

He used to be so beautiful. What had happened? When had he stopped being able to motivate himself to even eat or drink? When had his aspirations melted into nothing more than background noise as he shook and pleaded for his next chance to feed an addiction to something that was going to kill him anyway. It felt nice- to feel something at all that wasn't an aching need to carve into his own body.

Izaya gingerly steps into the shower and decides that he's going to take better care of the wounds. He washes his hair and cleans each infection with feather light touches and an antibacterial soap that stings much more than any stab into his skin. The poorly made stitches come out next- untied with his fingers and pulled out like he's ripping off a wax strip. The towel he uses is clean and fluffy like the ones he used back in Ikebukuro, and he can't believe how much he missed the little comforts of life.

Starting with the right wrist, he sprays the antibacterial medicine into the bruised yellow slits and hisses audibly at the discomfort. He repeats the process with his left wrist and both of his legs. When he brings the threat to the eye of the needle, his hands are steadier than they have been in months, and even more so as he takes the time to meticulously close every cut deemed too deep to heal on its own. The cotton pads get a healthy coat of a similar antibacterial ointment before they are pressed into his skin and secured with medical tape. He pulls on a pair of black boxer briefs that are far shorter than he would be comfortable being seen in and a sweater like the ones he used to wear in Japan. He even goes through the effort of towel drying his hair and pulling on a pair of socks before exiting the room and seeking the comfort of a clean bed that doesn't smell like his own blood.

He's beyond exhausted by the time his face meets the pillow, and his eyes close to embrace the first restful sleep he's had in months. Instead of dreaming of murders and torture and betrayal, he dreams of kind, golden eyes and a smile that's made his knees weak for a decade.


	6. Chapter 6

**(** A/N **) Hey so wow this is the second to last chapter guys. Like,, wow shit oh my god.**

 **Blackfallstar9: you are literally the light of my life i s2g. I get so excited to read your reviews specifically cause they mean just that much to me and this one is no different. Im so suprised that anyone hung around this long- let alone the fact that you've literally been here since day one. I hope you are here for the last of this.**

 **Kitkatlove96: wow im so glad you decided to read this! I know its,, to take in. thank you so much and for reading and reviewing. And no, i'm not offended that you ship me and blackfallstar** **(/ω** **＼** **)**

 **Xx-xX**

Shizuo's hands are trembling into instability as he grips the rail up the stairs. When he first found out that the address led to Dracula's Castle in Romania, he was more than a little confused, but in retrospect, it was so _Izaya_. It was dramatic, and gothic, with a past so tragic the details have turned to fables turned to brutality as the words crossed from mouth to mouth. It was so like him that Shizuo is upset that he didn't realize it sooner. Izaya was dramatic and so very extra that some big castle up in the mountains was right up his alley. It doesn't make the building any less foreboding. The air is heavy with the weight of a tragedy and it makes Shizuo's hair stand on end. When the wind picks up, it blows across the stone and picks up the scent of long standing sorry and the dust of the buildings bones settled with the new life being breathed into it.

This place is huge. It pisses Shizuo off to see Izaya burn his money like an old king. No one needs this much space, and the grand display of wealth burns what he refuses to acknowledge as envy. But if Izaya's in there, then he's going in too. He still isn't entirely sure why he's here. He doesn't know whether he's here for information about Itzal (or how he would get it for that matter) or if he's here for Izaya himself. He feels so lost in his own head.

Loneliness had been something that Shizuo had long since accepted as a part of his life- it's what it meant to be him with his strength and power. Those that showed an interest weren't really interested in him, they were interested in his strength or possibly saving their own ass. And then there was Izaya, who showed up out of nowhere and rocked Shizuo to his core from the first second they made eye contact in high school. He was adamant in his position to never fear Shizuo, and while originally, he believed that Izaya was only interested in him for his strength, the countless dinners they had had together had told another story.

Izaya had told Shizuo that his interest had stemmed from the rumors he had heard in middle school of this guy with super strength. Of course he wanted to know whether it was true or not, but once they had met, there was a spark of interest that went beyond Shinra's desire for experimentation. Rather than the why or how of Shizuo's strength, he wanted to know the what. What drove him? What was worthy of being a target and what wasn't worth the time? But more importantly, Izaya wanted to know what was important enough to Shizuo for him to hold back. The answer was boring, and Izaya thought it might be. Shizuo had said his loved ones: friends, family, lovers- the basic list of those that were close to him.

Izaya was unimpressed, as Shizuo might thought he would have been. He commented on how quick Shizuo had answered, almost as though it was obvious. To which Shizuo had asked Izaya how it couldn't be. The sad smile that set in just long enough to reach his eyes reminded Shizuo of their history.

From what he had learned, Izaya was a latch key kid. His parents had chosen their careers over their children and the result was Izaya being too young and too isolated to be a good enough role model for his sisters when they were left in his care. He cared about them, as much as he tried to deny it, but Izaya was far too protective of the twins to really pull off the "aloof brother."

It was kind of cute. Izaya tried so hard to hide everything that he was really interested in or what he really cared about because his line of work made those weaknesses. No one knew that Izaya had an affinity for horror movies (especially the supernatural kind). No one knew that he watched things like Buzzfeed Unsolved and stupid cartoons when he had the time. No one knew that he was excited for the new season of Haikyuu or that he played the second Psycho Pass in one sitting. These were things that Izaya had told Shizuo with a childish smile on his face and a heartbreaking preface of "I know it's stupid but-"

It made Shizuo think that he wasn't allowed to enjoy things, and he probably wasn't. The leash that that yakuza guy had on him was so tight, he couldn't even breath naturally. Every single move, every flutter of his lashes, every word, even every meal was strategically calculated to make him everything that Shiki had asked him to be. He didn't say any of that outright, but from the disdain he had picked up when Shinra had spoken about it, to the way Izaya always looked like a deer in the headlights when Shizuo had brought him up, he could figure it out. He's not as stupid as everyone thought he was. Well, he was, but he had his moments of clarity.

That didn't matter to Shizuo, though, as he pushed the twelve foot doors open. They gave immediately to the force of Shizuo's strength and swung into the darkness of grand hall. The castle itself, in short, creeped Shizuo out. He had a keen sense of what was right and what wasn't, and the grounds left a bad taste in his mouth and made his skin crawl. He felt like something very bad had happened here, and while he wasn't great at history, he had a vague sense that this place's history had something to do with it.

He sincerely hoped that Izaya himself hadn't succumbed to this suffocating sadness, but with the way that phantom blood smudged the air around him, Shizuo feared for the worst. He tells himself that that can't be what he's smelling, that the wind that carries heavy with the scent of iron had to do with the gnawing of ugly uncomfortable death that he believes marred this place at some point in its history. He follows the scent anyway, leading him through courtyards and hall ways until he finds the tower that the wind is funneling from, to a door surrounded in beds of red dahlias. The smell of blood is stronger here, shattering Shizuo's feeble hope of long forgotten memories on palace grounds.

He's taking the stairs two at a time, and practically skips up the last set until he's in front of another heavy oak door at the farthest wing of the castle. There's a few of them on this floor, all lined up in sequence with one another in a way that seems like a scene from a bad horror movie instead of Shizuo finding out if Izaya is alive or not. It's the second door on the left that has the strongest smell- the largest feeling of phantom life and movement, as though there was once a living body behind it. He can smell Izaya, can smell the faint hints of vanilla and bourbon that tend to float around him like he's dangerous but can be soft. There's also the smell of blood, so hot and raw that it makes his stomach fall to his feet, and when he find his courage enough to open the door, his hands shake as it pushes against the resistance of the wood.

The sight before him looks like something out of a horror movie. Discarded knives were scattered all over every surface. Worse than that, there is a rumpled pile of stained brown sheets and a stain so incriminating in the middle of a mattress that it looks as though someone had been murdered. The room reeks so heavily of iron that it spins his head into putty. Shizuo can't help but fear the worst. There's too much blood- too much pain so saturated between these four walls that it makes him feel guilty. He knew the kind of state Izaya's mental health had been in and still did nothing at the request of Shinra who hadn't seen how soft Izaya can really be. Shinra hadn't seen the way Izaya's eyes shine when he gets excited or the way that Izaya covered his mouth when he laughed cause he thought it was ugly and loud. Shizuo always tried to make Izaya laugh.

Izaya isn't here, though. He's not in the bathroom, or the closet, and he's not tucked under the bed like Shizuo might have thought he would have been. The amount of dust Shizuo kicked up when he went running through this castle proved to him that no one had shuffled through the main halls in quite sometime, not Izaya, and surely not a coroner or police officers inspecting a body. The blood had dried, but it stunk too much to be much older than a day, if that.

He'll kick down every damn door in this building if that's what it takes to find Izaya. He's gotta be in terrible shape- limited mobility by his own blood loss. He needs help. He's needed help for years, and Shizuo was either too dumb or too blind to see it. Maybe he was both, but he's here now, and being late was better than never showing up at all. He was here, and he was scared that it was too late, but if he wasn't, he'd be here for Izaya for however long it took to make him better. And if not better, he'd be here to make sure that Izaya's burden was at least easier to bare.

Shizuo left the room back as he found it, maybe with a bit more splintered wood, but that didn't matter. He was ready to start destroying this tower brick by brick, ready to not stop until he found Izaya and made sure that he was okay and he was alive. What he wasn't ready for, was Izaya to come strolling out of the room right next to the one Shizuo was just in.

He looked horrible. His skin was staunch white- nearly translucent as veins stuck out underneath his paper thin skin. His cheeks were hollow, and almost as sunken is as his eyes. His mouth was pulled tight on a frown that looks forced, but his eyes were flooded with so much relief that Shizuo knew he's faking dismay. He was weaker, starvation slinking the lean muscle he once had off of his body and leaving him a skeleton wrapped in skin. He looked like a ghost, and if not for the tremble in his fists and the raw _fear_ that chased out the solace in his eyes, Shizuo would have thought he was.

"'Zaya-" The nickname tumbled off his lips with a sigh.

This was wrong. Izaya shouldn't be afraid of Shizuo. He never was, and he wasn't supposed to be now.

"What are you doing here?"

His voice cracks when he says it in such a way that Shizuo can't help but go to him. The way they embraced was something desperate and ugly, but Shizuo wouldn't have had it any other way. Izaya was here and breathing in his arms, and he was covered and bandages that hid scabs that had torn open with the way he was clinging to Shizuo's shirt.

Shizuo put his chin against the top of Izaya's head, rubbing soothing circles into Izaya's back- flinching as each vertebrae stabbed into his hand.

"I was looking for you."

"You shouldn't have. I thought you wanted me gone," he was whispering by now, sounding more as though he was trying to convince himself more than he was Shizuo.

"It's not like that anymore," Shizuo said, and gripped tighter around Izaya's shoulders.

And like that, Izaya was pushing away, holding Shizuo at arm's length and taking another step back for good measure. "Right. This isn't about me. It's about Itzal, isn't it?"

Shizuo perks up immediately at the mention of his name. "You know where he is then?"

"Something like that," he sighs, and again his eyes are filled with fear and pain and it makes Shizuo sick.

"What's wrong?"

"God, where do I begin? I took some time to myself out here, and then I hear something that sounds like a wild animal trying to escape its confines, and when it's quiet again, I see you standing in the hallway with this determined look on your face, and," he pauses. "-I don't know. I don't know anything anymore, and I definitely don't know about you, or what I'm supposed to do about you."

"Wait, so you just heard me rummaging around in there, and you didn't think to come investigate?"

"What do you want from me, Shizuo? It's a haunted castle, you're hardly the first thing that's knocked shit around in presumably empty rooms. If I hunted down every slamming door and heavy foot step, I'd never stop searching."

Shizuo missed this so much. Missed the ways that Izaya was crass when he wasn't hiding, and the way that he was honest and logical in the ways that Shizuo wasn't. He chuckles then, low and deep in his chest in a way that makes Izaya snicker from his stronghold against the door.

"I missed you," he voices then, with a sigh so soft that Izaya would have thought he'd misheard if Shizuo hadn't repeated. "I've missed you so much."

"Are you sure it's me?"

"Again with that?" Shizuo's temper piqued behind his voice. Why was Izaya so hell bent on putting himself second. Why can't Shizuo have them both- miss them both equally?

"I'm being honest, and you should too," He spoke with a detached eloquence- one Izaya normally reserves for clients, and in that instant, Shizuo can see Izaya slipping a mask back into place.

"I am being honest," he growled. "I came all the way out here to find you-"

"So that I can find him for you." Izaya interjected. "You don't need to be so decisive. I can see right through you, Shizuo. You're selfish- just like everyone else."

His declaration stung Shizuo, not only because Izaya looked so broken and tired, but because he was right. He doesn't know if he still would have come out here if he wasn't sure that Izaya knew, and he can't say that we would have cause then Izaya would call his bluff. Izaya doesn't have time for liars or lies themselves. According to Shinra, most, if not all, of the lies that Izaya told, were to himself.

"Do you want me to leave?" He asks hoping to alleviate some of the tension by giving Izaya a choice.

"No."

His answer is quaint and comes too quickly to be anything other then absolute.

"Where is he?" He asks, which he regrets immediately from the way Izaya flinches back like he'd just been hit.

"You don't want to know. I promise. It's only gonna make everything worse."

Shizuo doesn't understand, but then again he's never understood. His conclusion comes out cracking in his voice when he asks, but he has to know. "Does he really hate me that much?"

"No- God no," and he said it so surely that Shizuo may think there's something bigger that Izaya isn't telling him. "That's not the problem."

"Then what is?"

"I can't tell you."

"'Zaya, please," and he's begging because this man is the key to his happiness, and he's hiding like he's done something wrong in a way that makes worry ebb into the crevices of his mind. "I need to see him- to know that he's okay." His voice is shaking on desperation.

"He's not!" Izaya yells then, loud and clear enough to echo along the stone of the empty hallway. "He's not fine- hasn't been fine in years. Maybe decades. He's a mess, and barely a shell of a functioning person because he's felt like an outcast his whole life, and the one time he gets something good- something that he thinks he can hold onto, the rug is pulled out from his feet and he lands flat on his face again. I can't take another heartbreak, and when you find out about me, you're gonna leave, and this image of puppy love is gonna fall to nothingness, like it should have when I left you on that roof."

Shizuo's stare is blank and empty, and what little color there is drains from Izaya's face.

"When 'he' left you, I mean."

But it's too late, and Shizuo is already reaching forward to grab at Izaya before he has the chance to calculate an escape route. He was trapped then, by an unbreakable strength and the weight of Shizuo's golden eyes staring craters into his face. He knows what he said, and he knows that Shizuo finally has an answer because Izaya was too stupid, too lost in his own emotion to register what was coming out of his mouth before he blurted out this biggest secret he's ever kept in his life.

"Show me."

"Show you what," it's feeble, and poorly executed, and Izaya knows he just backed himself further into a corner.

"Izaya."

It's commanding in a way that makes tears swell behind Izaya's eyelids. He hates this- hates the control that Shizuo has had over him since the beginning. Hates the way that he caves under the expectation he can feel without having to see it carved into Shizuo's kind eyes.

He summons his suit, mainly because he doesn't know what else to do to get Shizuo to let go so that this whole thing can be over and done with. It can't possibly hurt more to be right than it does to stave off the truth from coming out, but the sooner Shizuo sees it with his own eyes, the sooner he leaves, and Izaya can break down in peace.

It feels different this time. The previous times that Izaya had pulled on his suit, it had been cold, but there had been a mirthful sense of joy that always seemed to go hand in hand with impending danger. This was different, however. This was freezing and sorrowful and made him feel like he was thrown into a pond in the dead of winter. It feels empty.

Shizuo's grip goes a bit slack on his wrist. "Izaya, look at me."

He can't. He can't bring his eyes to settle on the disappointment that he can expect already on Shizuo's face, and the expectation in his voice hits like a physical blow against Izaya's heart. Shizuo didn't let go of him entirely. His touch never completely left Izaya's skin, and then there's a tug, and Izaya folds immediately into the embrace that Shizuo is pulling him into.

"I'm sorry," Izaya whispers, choking around the tears he didn't know had started falling. "I didn't mean for this to happen."

And he didn't. He didn't mean to fall in love with Shizuo not once, but twice. He didn't mean to drag him along and lie to him about who he really was. He didn't mean for Shizuo to see him the way he really was, and he didn't mean for Shizuo to know him.

He should have never taken this job. He should have said no and gone back to the way everything was before- when he was lonely, but stable, when no one cared about his well being, and he didn't have to feel guilty. He wished he could go back to before he knew what it was like for Shizuo to be in love with him.

"No, I'm sorry. I should have figured it out sooner. I thought about it, and I should have said something, and we could have avoided all of this." He's squeezing tighter at Izaya's shoulders and takes no time supporting both of their weight when Izaya's knees give out.

The expected outcome was something far worse. Izaya was ready for disgust and rejection and violence, not the single most tender embrace he's ever been in and a determination set so raw in Shizuo's voice, that it carries with it a promise to protect.

He couldn't pinpoint the exact moment that his suit vanished, but he felt the warmth of Shizuo's hand at his jaw chase away all of the cold isolation from his powers. That kiss was more fragile and tender then a feather ghosting past either of their lips. It's a question, of whether this is still okay, if it's still okay for them to be close and intimate because despite everything they had done in their personas, this is still too raw- _too vulnerable_ for both of them.

Shizuo is the first to pull away, but he doesn't stray far. "I really should have known it was you. No one else can affect me like you do."

Izaya still can't stare at him like he wants to. He's too overwhelmed by all of it- by the way Shizuo is running a hand through his hair, or the phantom taste of Shizuo on his lips, that he's missed far more than he would have liked. Instead he stays where he is, leaning on Shizuo for support and drinking up every ounce of acceptance he had denied himself of for so long.


	7. Chapter 7

**(** A/N **) This is it you guys,,, this is the final chapter. The ride has been incredible and even as I write this, I'm crying because I feel like this is the end of an era. I started this fic with two beta readers and now im finishing it alone and with one less friend. I'm gonna write something else all by myself, also for Shizaya once this is over, but I'd like to thank you all for sticking with this. You all really made this whole adventure worth it. Once again, thank you.**

 **Blackfallstar9: you have no idea how much you have done for me. You were honestly one of my major motivations for finishing this story and i would get so excited for your reviews. I am honored that you read this for so long and im so happy that you made it a point to keep up with this, and I hope you stick around for what I churn out next.**

 **Xx-xX**

Christmas had come and gone with little more than a phone call between Shizuo and Shinra. Izaya was getting better, nursed almost obsessively by Shizuo who was hell bent on seeing Izaya's smile reach his eyes again. New Years was a little better. Some of Izaya's color had returned to his face, and he had spent less time sleeping, and more time humoring Shizuo's attempts at conversation.

Izaya settled perfectly into Shizuo's chest once the former was finally able to coax him into the same bed. Nothing had happened, as Shizuo was incredibly adamant on keeping his distance, however they would watch movies and nap together when the effort of conversation weighed too heavily on Izaya's mind.

It was almost laughable how much Shizuo still had to learn about Izaya. Shizuo never had any semblance of a preference with what they were doing- far more content to watch Izaya breathe and laugh at a distance where he could watch the way his hair fell, but Izaya's affinity for superhero movies (one that had seemingly started _after_ all of this had begun), was absolutely precious to Shizuo. Izaya prefered Marvel to DC- thinking the characters were more believable in a town that actually existed as opposed to the additional fiction of Gotham, and was more than happy to offer his philosophies on such when Shizuo was willing to listen.

It seemed as though the comfort of physical proximity was all that Izaya cared about on his road to stability. Some days were still hard. Izaya was noncomplicitant in some factions, mainly in Shizuo's resolve to stay by his side as long as he needed. It was as though the toxicity of his previous relationships was bleeding into the way he saw Shizuo. He was guarded- constantly ready for this horrible idea that Shizuo would either grow bored or, in Izaya's own words, 'realize that he wasn't worth the effort'. It broke Shizuo's heart to see how low he saw himself, as though he wasn't worthy of love and happiness. He wished that Izaya could see himself the way that Shizuo saw him. Izaya was enigmatic. He was the smartest person that Shizuo had ever met, and he was funny, and kind if you were able to stick through the horse shit that regularly came out of his mouth. In addition to his character, which was far more three dimensional than Shizuo had originally given him credit for, he was beautiful. He was gorgeous even when his eyes were pulled down with the weight of sleep deprivation, and with the way the light had faded from them. Shizuo loved him so wholly that it almost frightened him how easily he was able to mesh what he felt for both Itzal and Izaya himself. They were so similar but so different, and the relief of knowing they were the same person was nothing short of indescribable.

Mid way through January, Izaya was insistent on returning to Japan, and Shizuo was running out of reasons to make him stay. As much as he would miss how quiet their routine had turned with in the month of Izaya's self imposed exile, Shizuo was starting to miss the exterior hussle and bussle of living in Ikebukuro. He liked drama, just when it wasn't _his_ drama to deal with, and with the promise that Izaya wouldn't push him away once they got home, he helped Izaya pack up what little belonging he had brought with him and they had left.

Izaya wasn't expecting such a warm reception at the airport once their flight had landed. He was expecting maybe Shinra and Celty at best. However, once they made it through security, it was his sisters that got to them first. Shinra pulled Izaya into a bruising hug- one that Celty quickly joined in. The raira trio made a brief show of their welcome back, and Kadota offered a sharp pat on the back to both of them, offering both congratulations to Izaya and condolences to Shizuo. The most surprising however, was Namie, who tugged Izaya into a sharp hug and gave a kurt 'thank you' to Shizuo before leaving just as quickly and silently as she had arrived.

They all went to dinner after that. Izaya's recent ability to keep down solids made him absolutely ravenous, and he could think of no where better to eat than Russia Sushi. If Shinra's hug pressed into his ribs, Simon's forced the air from his lungs, but Shizuo's feet were also no longer on the ground, so at least Izaya wasn't the only one being embarrassed. Izaya talked about Romania- about the things he'd seen and the places he'd been prior to his personal isolation. He left out the blood and gore, but everyone had made a comment about how much weight he lost and how he looked a lot more tired. Shinra had asked him what he was going to do without working for the yakuza. It was a bit of an issue that he had talked about with Shizuo. He had other clients, and without the overwhelming workload from Shiki, he could take on more, lower priority clients. He'd be fine, and even if he never worked again, he would be fine.

The members of their party had trickled out one by one like a puddle drying until it was left with just Shizuo, Celty, Shinra, and himself.

"So, what happens now?"

Celty pulls her phone back to her chest and types again in order to clarify.

"Between you two... I mean."

"What do you mean?" Shizuo asks, clutching a bit harder at Izaya's hand on the booth between them.

"I think what my darling Celty means is," Shinra interjects, "Now that you both know about, well, _everything_ , what do you do now? What's your next move?"

"I'm gonna go back to Shinjuku, and start working again now on my local turf. Maybe toss in a few dalliances with vigilante justice if I find the motivation," he purrs with a side eye toward Shizuo. "Maybe see if I can find that _bear guy_ , and we can throw some rounds."

"Shut up," Shizuo growls, but it sounds more endearing then threatening even to his own ears. "We're going home, and we're gonna go to sleep and worry about all that shit later."

"Shizu-chan, that's hardly practical."

"Well neither are we," he snaps back with another squeeze at Izaya's hand. "And we're gonna figure this out, but tonight we're gonna go to bed and sleep off the jet lag."

If not for the way Shizuo's thigh presses reassurance into Izaya's, he would have thought for sure that Shizuo was being serious.

The door itself doesn't even close properly before Shizuo has Izaya pressed into it. Their lips meet with fever, all previous sweetness that was thick in their usual kisses was replaced with an overwhelming heat. Izaya's patients had been running impossibly thin with the way that Shizuo was keeping him at arm's length, and now that he had Shizuo's hands and lips in places that he had vehemently refused to touch, he wasn't going to take it lightly. Izaya's legs rose to the expectation of Shizuo's hands, open and lifting him till his weight was being supported exclusively by the bruising grip of Shizuo's fingers through his jeans.

Their kisses meld into something more twisted on desperation. It is Shizuo absolutely pillaging Izaya's mouth with his tongue, and Izaya nipping on his lips when his jaw aches from the intrusion. Izaya tastes like the same bitter sushi that he had eaten for dinner, but once Shizuo was able to lick past that, he tasted _Izaya_ who felt like danger and love on his tongue. The heat was stifling- more so brought on when Izaya's hands dip from around Shizuo's neck to start with the buttons on his usual white button down. It lacks the regular grace that Izaya tends to bleed into all of his tasks, however with the way his hands are shaking in anticipation with what the promise of Shizuo's lips meant, Izaya was content to submit to the trembling.

Shizuo's hands squeezed into Izaya's thigh with a crushing reassurance. He is here and this is _finally_ happening, and Izaya didn't need to know about how many nights Shizuo had spent alone thinking about seeing Izaya like this, and Shizuo didn't need to know about how many years Izaya had spent doing the same. The years of fighting didn't matter as Shizuo carries Izaya up the stairs and into the bedroom upstairs.

Izaya's breath is coming out in short puffs against Shizuo's mouth. He is pliant under Shizuo's ministrations, back arching for Shizuo to strip him, and legs opening for the assurance of his weight with little to no persuasion. Shizuo doesn't have the chance to realize where Izaya's feather light touches stripped him of his clothes, but he does notice how hot Izaya's skin was under his hands.

Shizuo's lips at Izaya's neck turn to teeth that sunk into his skin hard enough to break it. He doesn't like the idea of leaving Izaya with more scars, but the moan of his name that falls from Izaya's parted lips was more then enough reassurance. He knew Izaya was a masochist, and he knew that Izaya had a thing for feeling claimed, so the bite marks were more than enough to teeter him closer to the edge.

Izaya's hips push into Shizuo's with another gasp, and with that, Shizuo was reaching for the lube Izaya had left in the night stand. He slicked up three of his fingers and pressed his middle finger against Izaya's entrance with a returned fever.

"Tell me if it hurts," he groans, and Izaya wants to laugh because Shizuo was far from the first person to be inside of him like this.

Izaya's heat was almost unbearable. More than that, the pressure of just one knuckle breaking past the ring of muscle into him was constricting in a way that made him glance at Izaya's face to see if there was any hint of pain etched into his features. It isn't there, instead there is a warmth that Shizuo had seen every second from the time he kissed Izaya in Romania, now laden molten hot with in unmistakable amount of lust. Shizuo pushes a little further and a little harder with his finger sliding fully into Izaya's heat while the other's breath skids on a moan that he was obviously trying to cover up.

He is a lot louder than Shizuo had expected, and from the way that Izaya sucks his bottom lip between his teeth and chewed on self consciousness, he was being a lot louder than normal.

Shizuo presses another finger into Izaya and his nails scrape into the sheets beneath him. His skin is shiny with a sheen of sweat, and Shizuo is leaning forward to kiss the moans from Izaya's lips while he rocks his fingers further into his heat. Izaya is babbling- Shizuo's name is thrown into the mix among general expletives of pleasure, but he heeds Izaya's demand of "more" when it comes.

The third enters with much less resistance, and Izaya keens loudly to arch down onto Shizuo's fingers. Shizuo's lips trace his pulse point in his neck again, sucking until the skin blossoms with a bruise like the handprints on his hips. More teeth sink into his clavicle until Izaya's hand is shooting to grab desperately at Shizuo's wrist.

"Are you okay?" he asks, pausing immediately on all fronts of movement.

"I'm fine," Izaya chuckles breathlessly, "But if you want this to go any further than foreplay, you better get on with it."

His suggestion is spoken more like a demand, but Shizuo wastes no time in heeding the warning. His fingers pull out with another whine from Izaya's lips, and a flash of anger across his face.

Shizuo is smiling at him lovingly again, like he has been the past month. "Condom?"

"No?" Izaya asks, phrasing it like a question, but the speed to his reply left no room for reconsideration.

Izaya is laying down staring heat and expectation into Shizuo's skin when he slicks himself up and moves to line up with Izaya's entrance.

"Tell me-"

"If it hurts?" Izaya cuts in. "I will. Just put it in. Haven't I waited enough?"

His desperation is rubbing off on Shizuo when he presses the head of his cock against the resistance of Izaya's hole, but the first initial push yields no results for entry, and neither does the second.

"It's not gonna fit," Shizuo declares, more than willing to sink his fingers back into Izaya until he's stretched properly.

"Like hell it's not." Izaya growls, and that seems to be the only warning Shizuo gets before Izaya's hips are angling to flip Shizuo until his back presses soft against the mattress.

Izaya's hips come up to hover over Shizuo's and Shizuo is prepared to stop him until Izaya's left hand comes to grab firmly at the base of Shizuo's cock and drag friction and lubrication up to the head and back down the shaft. Izaya's eyes glance at Shizuo's with more hunger than he's ever seen in them, but Shizuo thinks he looks like some sort of animal with how turned on his is by the bite marks on Izaya's neck and his conviction about their current actions.

"You just need to use a little more pressure." Izaya is purring now, dropping his weight onto the head of Shizuo's cock until it passes through the first ring of muscle at Izaya's insistence.

Shizuo chokes on a growl that isn't loud enough to drown out the moan that falls from Izaya's mouth as he continues to sink. He's not giving himself a minute to adjust- too desperate to feel everything Shizuo has to offer to consider stopping to save himself the pain that will likely immobilize him with discomfort in the morning.

"Slow down," Shizuo gasps, hands reaching to clutch again at Izaya's hips.

"No," Izaya insists again, and in one final movement, their hips meet, tearing a scream from Izaya on top of him.

"Does it hurt?" Shizuo gasped once Izaya is fully seated.

His back arches roughly, the tension pulling his skin against the resistance of his muscles, with a gasp that is ripped so hoarsely from his throat that Shizuo thought it must have hurt just to produce. "Yes," he sweared, and his head was sweeping back up to stare at Shizuo with his pupils consuming the red that normally rests in his eyes. "God yes! Give me more."

And with that, his hips rise and sink back to seat himself onto Shizuo. He is unexplainably _hot_ with a pressure that borders pain into both of their skin, but Izaya isn't stopping- isn't even pausing to smother out the pain he has to be feeling. Shizuo just keeps clutching at Izaya's hips to offer support that he keeps pushing past to run his hips down. Shizuo pushes up exactly once into the expectation of his weight before Izaya screams so loud, Shizuo is convinced that he has hurt him.

"Fuck me," he demands, staring down at Shizuo like a predator catching on the actual _glow_ of the red in Izaya's eyes as he grins.

Shizuo presses his hands into stability at Izaya's hips and keeps them pressed firmly together as he turns Izaya back to laying down on the mattress. As much as he absolutely loves the way Izaya looks riding him, he knows that if he really wants to make Izaya feel good, and let him know how much Shizuo loves him, then that wet dream of his is gonna have to go on the back burner.

The pace he sets is merciless, pounding into Izaya hard enough to slam the headboard into the wall behind it. Not like that volume matters much, as Izaya is screaming a mantra of Shizuo's name and a plethora of swear words, some occasionally outside of Japanese. Izaya's hand reaches to tug Shizuo's into a hold that clutches into desperation more than anything loving. Shizuo's mouth crushes into Izaya's again as sweat begins to bead on his brow. For how hard he's trembling at Shizuo's mouth, Izaya is holding out for an impressively long time. His stamina has never been anything to sneeze at, however his eyes are starting to glass over while he clutches helplessly at Shizuo's hand and bicep.

And he looks _amazing_. He's incredible with the way Shizuo's marks bloom so deeply on his ivory skin with his eyes glowing bright as car lights in the darkness of the bedroom. He's begging for more- begging for Shizuo to come inside of him just like he's been waiting for, and Shizuo is in no position to deny that request. His hips push a few more times, shorter thrusts as opposed to the languid depth he was providing before, before he comes to a stop and comes hard and final into Izaya's waiting body, and the warmth that spills inside of him pushes Izaya over that final edge with a scream of Shizuo's name and the harsh scrape of his nails at Shizuo's skin.

They breathe together for a moment, Izaya purring around the feeling of Shizuo's come cooling inside of him, and Shizuo being too blissed out to laugh at Izaya for it.

That time will come later, years from now, when they have built an empire in Ikebukuro- cleaning it of its crime spree the way Shizuo had always wanted, but they go home together to Shinjuku at the end of every night. They find themselves wrapped in each others limbs more often than not, but there is no where either of them would rather be.

Izaya didn't miraculously get better, but now he isn't alone. Shizuo was there, and Shizuo swore that he would be there for however long Izaya was willing to keep him.


End file.
